After 30 years, a chance to say thanks

Sunday

Sep 9, 2012 at 3:15 AM

It's been 30 years, but I finally said thank you to the man who saved my daughter's life.

Emily was born on July 11, 1982. My husband, Dan, and I always joke that she is our lucky girl with a 7-11 birthday every gambler hopes to roll at the craps table. But our first born daughter wasn't so lucky the day she came into the world.

It was a hot, sticky Sunday morning. I slept uncharacteristically late (8 o'clock) because I'd been at York Beach the whole day before just lolling on the sand. My stomach looked like I had swallowed a beach ball. I was pregnant and had just six more weeks to go.

I intended to go to the beach again that Sunday, but Emily had other plans. She wanted out.

When I jumped out of bed, my water broke. The beach trip was off. I knew I was going to the hospital and that I would have a baby that day. Dan and I were both a little apprehensive because our baby was so early, but it didn't seem so dire.

"Six weeks isn't too bad, is it?" I asked Dan.

"Nah, everything will be fine," Dan tried to reassure me.

Certainly, a baby born six weeks early had a pretty good chance, I told myself. It wasn't like those teeny, translucent babies hooked up to every piece of available technology for months and months. I was sure my baby wouldn't be like that at all.

Dan and I made short work of the birthing process. It was over by 3:30 that afternoon. Dan caught our daughter in his arms because the medical staff had briefly stepped out of the room to attend to other patients. Even they weren't expecting Emily so soon.

Our little girl had a full head of jet-black hair and looked like a normal newborn. At 5 pounds, 15 ounces, she was neither teeny, nor translucent. Her color was good, very pink, but the doctors and nurses crowding the room seemed very flustered.

She wasn't breathing very well so they whisked her away to see if they could get her stabilized.

Dr. Sol Rockenmacher, a pediatrician working for the Dover Pediatric Professional Association, was called in on Emily's case. Data from her blood work showed low oxygen saturation. She was a very sick baby, sick enough that she needed to be transferred to Dartmouth-Hitchcock Medical Center in Hanover. There they had a high-level neonatal unit with all the equipment and expertise to help our baby survive.

Emily left just before midnight on the day she was born. I did not know if I would ever see her again.

She stayed at Dartmouth for four days and then returned to Wentworth-Douglass Hospital in Dover for nine more days before we were able to take her home. Her sucking response was so weak, she had to be fed through a tube threaded through her mouth and throat and into her stomach in what is called gavage feeding. Through it all, Dr. Rockenmacher kept a close eye on her.

Eventually, the crisis passed and Emily became like other newborns who slept a lot and cried when she was hungry. There seemed to be no remnants of her rocky start in life. She grew into a very bright little girl, who was athletically gifted and an early talker and reader.

Dr. Rockenmacher moved on, too. Not long after Emily's birth and health crisis, he left his Dover practice and became a pediatric cardiologist at Dartmouth Hitchcock.

I always meant to write him a letter to let him know he had saved Emily and that I was so grateful. But, it never happened. I was a fairly inept mother of a newborn and went back to work just six weeks after Emily's birth. Most days were a struggle, so a thank-you note was not No. 1 on my to-do list.

Just recently, I had the opportunity to right that wrong. Dr. Rockenmacher returned to the Seacoast area at the end of August to attend a breakfast commemorating the 40th anniversary of the Strafford Learning Center, an educational collaborative formed here to help children struggling in school. Dr. Rockenmacher was one of the founders.

Dan works for the learning center and I work for Foster's, so we both went to the breakfast and got our chance to thank the doctor in person.

"You probably don't remember us, but you saved our daughter's life," I said as I shook his hand.

Dan and I recounted the dramatic circumstances of Emily's birth, and Dr. Rockenmacher had a flash of recognition.

"Yes, I do remember," he said, smiling.

Then we told him that saving baby Emily had a ripple effect he never could have envisioned. She grew up to be a registered nurse caring for the sick. Eventually, she went back to school and earned a master's degree to become a psychiatric nurse practitioner ministering to those with mental health problems.

It may be 30 years late, but I hope Dr. Rockenmacher understands the depth of our gratitude every day.

Thank you for our beautiful Emily!

Mary Pat Rowland is the managing editor of Foster's and can be reached at mprowland@fosters.com.